1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to beverage cooling and dispensing devices. More particularly, it concerns new forms of multiple beverage container assemblies that may be placed in domestic refrigerators for cooling and from which beverages may be dispensed with ease as desired.
2. Description of the Prior Art
It is common pratice to store numerous containers of different size and shape in domestic refrigerators to cool their contents, e.g., milk, water, fruit juices and other beverages. Because of the size and shape variations of the containers, efficient use of shelf space is difficult to attain. Moreover, frequently, a container holding the desired beverage is at the rear of a shelf which presents the annoyance of removing an unwanted article from the shelf to obtain access to the required container. Such problems of refrigerator storage and use of beveage containers has prompted the conception and development of numerous devices atteptimg to overcome them.
One solution has been to provide containers that are located within a refrigerator from which beverages may be dispensed without opening the refrigerator door (see U.S. Pat. No. 2,408,704). Such devices are invariably expensive, usually require special refrigerator construction and may cause as much loss of refrigeration energy as they are intended to save by reducing the number of times the refrigerator is opened.
Containers with dispenser spouts designed to slide onto refrigerator shelves have been developed (see U.S. Pat. No. 1,905,133 and 2,027,092). Alternatively, the drink coolers may be carried on special racks mounted in the refrigerator and the dispenser front of the device may be contoured to mount the dispenser spout (see U.S. Pat. No. 1,936,517). Also, this general type device has been made with multiple containers that can be held assembled on a rack (see U.S. Pat. No. 3,178,061).
In spite of the many prior art refrigerator dispensers that have been developed, there is a need for improvements, e.g., lower cost, elimination of need to alter the refrigerator structure, increased ease of use and cleaning, etc.